Ontario-wide hydro strike looms June 6

TORONTO, ONTARIO - An additional 100 Hydro One engineers and other professionals were to walk off the job June 3 in support of 200 workers already on strike at a key Barrie control centre.

Bill Jones, acting president of the Society of Energy Professionals Local 160, blamed the expansion of the labour disruption on Hydro One's plans to use buses and helicopters to bring in members of the Power Workers' Union to bypass picket lines at the utility's Ontario grid control centre in Barrie where staff began a strike June 1.

"We live in a society that values freedom of expression," Jones said. "It is shameful to see the management of a public company pay tens of thousands of dollars of ratepayers' money to deny this basic human right (to strike) to their employees."

Peter Gregg, a Hydro One spokesman, said the company will use whatever means necessary to get workers to their jobs "without intimidation by the strikers."

Jones said the strike by professional employees will spread across Ontario JUne 6 if their contract dispute with the province's power distributor is not settled by then.

But Gregg said the system can run for several months without the professionals as trained management staff "will ensure that the system runs reliably."

The workers oppose proposals for a 10 per cent pay cut for new employees and a four-hour increase in their 35-hour week without extra pay.